No one comments anymore.
I’m tempted to follow NPR’s lead, and remove comments on RealCentralVA. As they noted, naturally, on Twitter:
Significant stat on comment retirement: Only .003 percent of visitors posted even once a month over three months.
The blog has slowly been moving this way, inline with the broader internet trends. I reverted from Disqus comments to native WordPress comments some time ago, and won’t do a Facebook business page in order to integrate Facebook comments (and wouldn’t anyway because I refuse to cede any more to Facebook than I already have)
(Related: What happens if … Facebook decides it doesn’t like what you say?)
In short, no one comments anymore. I’m thinking if someone really wants to comment on something, we can have that conversation over email, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or, better, in person.